


Dornish Heat

by thewaywetalk



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, I just couldn't stop thinking about it, I know, I suck at titles, Idk if i should tag it as Ashara/Ned, but not really IT, it's hinting at it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-24
Updated: 2013-01-24
Packaged: 2017-11-26 16:50:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/652391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewaywetalk/pseuds/thewaywetalk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ned arrives at Starfall to deliver Dawn, he and Ashara have a chat.</p><p>Edited cause I'm an idiot and copied the wrong unedited file. Only like a sentence or two change though.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dornish Heat

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first fic in like YEARS. My first fics were awful to begin with (I'm thinking of taking them down). But, I thought of this and could not get it out of my head. I wanted her to have that last paragraph.
> 
> But anyway please review, I NEED the help/criticisms.
> 
> Disclaimer: GRRM doesn't like FanFics, so obviously this is form my mind borrowing his characters but only like three...well five if you count minor ones.

The last time they had seen each other was at the Tourney at Harrenhal. Where she had kissed his cheek and he had blushed. It had been right before she had taken his brother to bed, the last time she had seen either before they left in a haste after Rhaegar's spectacle with their sister. She now wondered why she didn’t chose him instead. Now, he had grown taller in the past year, looked weary from war but stood no less proud than a man who helped win a war should stand. Man grown he was. Not as tall as his brother, no, and perhaps not as handsome. But, Eddard Stark stood taller than most men would, presenting the sword of a man who they killed to the that man’s sister, a woman they might have loved.

“Did you kill him yourself at least?” she asked taking the sword in both hands. Heavy it had always been. She remembered how before her father had warned her she couldn’t touch it, lest it cut her. When he showed it to her and Arthur, he always held it firmly in hand.

“I couldn’t have defeated such great men by myself, Howland Reed helped. Plus five other great men.” He looked at her now, staring right into her eyes. He had always done that. Unlike his brother, and practically every man since she was four and ten. Not once did his scan her body, at least, not when she was so close to him. During their dance he had been hesitant and nervous. Now he stood tall and no longer looked like a green boy about to spill confessions of love and her beauty. He was war worn.

“Helga, please, Lord Stark and his companion. must be tired. Show them to the guest chambers.” It was then that she looked closely at Ned’s companion, a short man, shorter than her. He carried a bundle in his arms. Ned spoke.

“We also are in need of a wet nurse” Ashara looked at him. Her lips twitched, “Of course. Helga find Wylla’s whereabouts, we paid for her, we might as well use her for Reed’s bastard.” Helga left with a bow. Reed only shifted the bundle in his arms, shooting a look to Ned. “Come” she said turning so they would follow her up the stairs and into the castle.

“He is my child” Ned said behind her. Ashara turned, wide eyed, looking from Ned to the child in the crannogman’s arms, a child with black hair and what she assumed were Stark grey eyes. Ned Stark, the boy with fumbling steps and blush at her chaste kiss, had a bastard. She had heard of his marriage of course, felt a bit of triumph that Catelyn Tully wouldn’t get Brandon in the end, but pity that she would be stuck with such a serious boy, not yet man that she had still thought him. She had even assumed he never bedded a woman, _though with that crude pig for a friend, it isn’t impossible to believe he fathered a bastard_. The Tully girl got a Stark that was not a handsome, reckless fool without any bastards, but the Stark who had a live bastard, probably taking it with him. Helga came back with Wylla.

“I’ll take the child m’lord.” Reed handed the child to Wylla. The child woke, squirming and making little cooing sounds. Ashara looked away, the child was so small, so small like another child, another black-haired, silver-eyed bastard.

“We rode through the night, feeding the boy some goat’s milk from the town near the Tower, but he went through it quick.” Reed explained as Wylla slid the fabric of her gown down her shoulder, freeing her breast for the hungry babe.

“I’ll be in the old nursery then.” She nodded towards them. “M’lady, m’lords.” She headed to the stairs on the left.

Ashara turned back to Helga, “Take the men to their chambers, I’m sure they’d appreciate a bath and some food as well. Give them what they want.” She didn’t give them time to respond, pivoting on her heel she headed to her chambers. She stayed there well into the night, taking her dinner in her chambers avoiding Ned and his companion, and Wylla and the baby who looked all Stark.

It was later that night that Ahara saw him again, walking back towards her room, cleaning the fresh dirt from her nails, that she decided to head towards the kitchens, grabbing five skins of wine and proceeded to head towards the guest wing. She was there a short time later, already taking a long gulp from one of the skins. She gave a sharp rap on the door. Ned opened the door, wearing loose bed breeches that hung low on his hips.

“Ashara, is something wrong?”

“Yes, it has been a year, war has occurred and I’ve been remembering too much. Drink with me.” She handed over a skin of wine, putting the remaining three in front of her on the spacious window seat. She took a drink out of her skin, looking down onto the grounds through the open window, he no doubt was burning in such Dornish heat. Ned had gotten a view of the garden though, with it’s new addition of the rosebush, on the fresh mound of dirt, not a moon’s turn old just yet.

“Remembering?” Ned asked. She looked over at him, his chest glistening from the heat. He was a northerner after all, she remembered him mentioning the heat at Harrenhal, a place she found chilly and haunting. Yet, here he was in place warmer yes, but he seemed to have run leagues in the deepest south of Dorne, in the scalding hot sands. She hadn’t seen a man in such undress since Brandon. Before, at Harrenhal, before he had died, choking himself to death, while his father burned, while she and hundreds of others watched. She had vomited not long after, all over her loose fitting silk gown, to she had to hide her body and her vomiting after.

“No,” she shook her head, “I don’t want to talk about what I remember.”

“Then why are you here?” Ned came to the seat, there was enough room for them to sit on each end, the wineskins between them, it was cozy but it still feel like they were thousands of leagues apart.

She gave him a smile she knew usually had men looking at her chest. _It wouldn’t be difficult to fuck him in this seat_ , she thought. She licked her lips, tilting her head. Yet he did look away from her lavender eyes. She smirked. Here she was beautiful and willing, wearing a Dornish dress. A loose, sheer, silk that at one tug at the knot at the back of her neck had the dress slipping to the floor, leaving her as bare as her nameday. She did not believe in smallclothes. She lifted her legs onto the seat, maneuvering them to slip out through the high slits, leaning back on the cushion of the seat.

“Why do you think?” she countered.

“Ashara-”

“Oh, come on now! I know that you’re too honorable for that!” She spoke taking the second wineskin, “Yet, it seems that you might not have minded nine moons previously if that bastard is anything to go by.” She swallowed more wine, Dornish Red of course, breathing deeply. She didn’t want think anymore. It had been almost a moon's turn, she was getting better. Then he came bring that bastard with him, a baby with black curls and grey eyes.

“You’ve no right to talk about me or Jon like that!” The flash of anger was gone in a second, his expression soften after looking down at the gardens, at the rosebush.

“Ashara-”

“No.”

“Please. Are you alright?”

“You named the boy Jon? After Lord Arryn I suppose?” She asked wanting to change the subject to something even farther away than this. A child with an actual name. _Elia would have been a good name for girl, even before using it to honor an abandoned friend._ “Yes” he answered concern still written over his face, _Please don’t ask_. “and it is a Stark name. A child deserves a name no matter their birth” She nodded. A Stark name for an acknowledged bastard. A Martell name to honor a fallen friend, for an unknown bastard. _Gods, I shouldn’t have come._

“Have the rest of the wine Ned, I think I should head to bed.” She got up, knocking the wineskins to the ground, she didn’t see through the tears building up in her eyes. _No, not here not now!_

“Ashara please, just talk to me” Neds hands grabbed at her wrists, turning her around holding her hands in one of his, cupping her chin with the other to tilt it up. She looked into the grey eyes that had been so haunting for the past moons.

“How did you even know? I was able to hide even from the Mad King.”

“I overheard some men speak of it on the road. The Dornish beauty with a bastard, I didn’t want to presume, but your reaction to Jon...” She launched herself at him. Tears spilling on his neck and her gown. He held on tight, as they tumbled back on the seat. She sat half on top of him, her face buried in his neck, he smelled of sweat and leather and Stark, a similar scent to Brandon’s. Only stronger, alive.

“Forgive me,” she mumbled into his neck, still feeling the tears flow freely down her cheeks, “I haven’t really been myself since...” He shushed her rubbing circles to the small of her back. She chuckled at their position, “If anyone was to walk in and see our position, they’d think that Jon’s my son instead.”

She slid off his lap but stayed close on the seat, leaning her head on his shoulder. He stayed quiet, _he still doesn’t say much this one_. Ashara thought of the Tully girl once more. She would be married to this man, a quiet, kind, and despite his bastard, and honorable man. Brandon had died shortly before marrying the Tully girl, but Ashara wasn’t sure any longer who he had loved. Bedded, yes that was her claim. But had he loved her?

“You’ll be alright, Ashara. You’re a strong person.” She laughed again. A man of few words, but good words at least. Perhaps she should have bedded him at Harrenhal instead. Then, she’d be the the Lady of Winterfell, and Tully girl would be nothing but a past memory for the Starks, like Ashara was now.

“You know I pitied her, the Tully girl.” She said turning her head up to look at him. He wasn’t as handsome as Brandon, no, but he still had the Stark look, and his brooding ways made him attractive in his own way.

“Why?” he asked. She shrugged turning her head back down to her lap looking at her hands playing with his. “I guess because I thought I got the better Stark in the end. I thought, 'Brandon died loving me, and she gets a boy too serious for his age, a boy who isn’t as handsome or interesting as his brother.'” She felt him stiffen beneath her head at her words, she continued.

“But now I think I should envy her.”

“What? Why?” he asked as if it was truly an impossible thought, to envy the Tully girl for Ned, not Brandon.

“She gets _you_.” she responded looking up at him, “Brandon may have been more exciting I guess, but she wouldn’t have liked the idea of him and I as much as I do. He would have grown tired of her, and me as well. _And_  here I am willing and wearing a gown most Westrosi men love and Westrosi women are scandalized by, and you? You haven’t glanced down at my breasts or legs once. I doubt you ever have.” She laughed at his blush. “You are a good man Ned Stark, and despite the bastard, you’ll be a good husband. That’s why I envy her, she gets a good man to take care of her. While I get nothing but memories.”

His expression softened, “You're not just a memory, you are a strong person who will make it through this. We will _all_ make it through this. I promise.” Ashara smiled, she only hoped he was better at keeping promises than his brother. That she too could keep this promise.


End file.
